


You Could Have Gone Anywhere, But You Came Back

by Rave



Category: Dark Knight Rises (2012)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-18
Updated: 2012-11-18
Packaged: 2017-11-18 22:39:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,605
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/566062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rave/pseuds/Rave
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“You’re dead and you’re broke,” Selina says, working a little too hard to recover. “Neither one suits me. I’m a girl of expensive tastes, and I don’t like cold men.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	You Could Have Gone Anywhere, But You Came Back

“I didn’t know you smoked.” 

The voice is low, familiar, right next to her ear. She’d half-expected that something would happen -- the word _miracle_ had kept insinuating itself -- but she’d told herself it was idiotic, a fantasy. 

Her stomach drops, her stupid heart tripping itself up, but she doesn’t jump. Her feelings are whatever right now. Her body is disciplined, hard as a cage. The hand holding her cigarette stays absolutely steady. 

“Never when I’m working,” she says, letting herself smile, and turns to face him. 

Through her dark shades she can’t tell if he looks different. He always looked good when he was trying. He’s wearing horn-rimmed glasses, dark jeans, a soft-looking sweater under a scuffed leather jacket. His hair is cut shorter than she’s used to. She remembers how fatally good he smelled at that terrible party, how _expensive_ , all Bois du Portugal and single malt scotch and vicuña wool. Smells you had to live pretty high even to recognize.

“What’s a girl like you doing in a place like this?” he says, straight-faced. _What_ an idiot he is.

"Got a card in the mail,” she says, bringing the cigarette back to her lips. “I was invited to a funeral.” 

“Whose?” 

“Someone who annoyed me." She exhales a little plume of smoke. Relief is a giddy, thrilling spin that has her tingling from her ribcage to the tips of her fingers. It’s hard work to make sure none of it shows. 

“Well,” he says. “I hope he’s learned his lesson.”

“Doubtful,” Selina says. “I think it’s made him worse.”

He pauses for a second to take her in, and she lets him. She picked her armor carefully today, because she knew there would be something. Not this, maybe, but something. The dress is black silk, vintage Dolce. Selena wore it out of Celeste Thackeray-Ward’s library fundraiser under her caterer’s uniform: a service, really, because it looked infinitely better on her than it ever would on that poor stringy Celeste. The stockings, Wolford, smuggled out of Barneys inside a copy of French Vogue. The little Burberry capelet, the opera gloves, part of a midnight haul from Saks last winter. Chanel earrings, so easily and automatically palmed that she doesn’t even remember where they came from. The Louboutin pumps were actually legal, stuffed into a corner of the shoe section at Rags at a shocking, almost offensive price. 

Her face -- always her weakness and she knows it -- is a mask, a movie poster, a shorthand. Black veiled fascinator, black Tiffany sunglasses, deep matte red YSL lipstick. Her smallest smile itching at the curve of her mouth. 

After a moment he reaches for the pearls at her throat and lifts them delicately on his fingertips. His thumb brushes her collarbone and the skin shivers. Selina lets her eyes close for an instant, behind the glasses.

“They suit you,” Bruce says. It’s such a small compliment that it’s hard not to think he means it.

“I know,” she says, watching him from under her eyelashes. “I hope you don’t want me to take them back. I never keep the receipts.”

“They were a gift.” He sounds slightly injured.

“I’m not sure that’ll hold up in court. Under the circumstances.”

He nods like she’s made a good point, then frowns at her feet. “How are you walking in those? In all this mud --”

“Do men ever get bored of asking that question?” 

“I guess not.” He smiles at the ground, eyes crinkling pleasantly at the corners. He has a nice smile, which is probably why he’s so miserly about it. The one percent do love to keep their best stuff exclusive. “Sorry to bore you.”

“Actually, this may be the least boring funeral I’ve ever attended,” she says. “Although, in fairness, the bar was set pretty low.”

He offers his arm and after a moment she slips hers into it. When he takes her other hand in his to pull her in closer, he palms the cigarette so effortlessly that she’s barely even registered that it’s gone before he’s ashed it in the damp bark of an oak tree.

“Excuse you,” she says, pinching the inside of his elbow. There’s not much to pinch. His arms are big and they’re all muscle. 

“Filthy habit.” 

“But it’s _my_ filthy habit. You could have asked.”

“You would’ve said no. Anyway, it was just for the look and you’re more effective without it.”

Involuntarily her gaze snaps up to his face. He’s looking out at the Manor, not seeming to have noticed. 

“I don’t need your advice on how to be _effective_ ,” she says eventually. 

“You really don’t,” he agrees, looking back at her. The smile is still there, soft around his eyes. She remembers what it felt like to kiss him, how hard and obstinate his mouth was.

“So what? Is this the world’s most elaborate and unnecessary intervention? Trying to get me off my pack-a-year habit?”

“No.” He lets her lean on him to pick her way up an uneven set of stone stairs, up out of the little plot. Selina doesn’t need the support, but it won’t hurt to let him think she does. Anyway, his body is broad and solid and warm. “As a matter of fact, I wanted to ask you out. I didn’t have your number.”

She actually lifts her sunglasses to stare at him. “You’re kidding.” 

“Not at all. What are you doing after this?”

“Writing an extremely interesting letter to the _Gazette_ about the fate of Bruce Wayne. You can’t ask me out.”

“Why not?” 

“For one thing, you’re dead.”

“I know. Leaves a guy with a lot of free time on his hands.” He glances up at the low, threatening sky, his brow creasing. “It’s going to snow in a minute. Come on, this way.”

“I’m not just -- Bruce! Where the hell are you--”

“I was thinking about Italy. Oh, you mean now? Now, I was just thinking this is the quickest way to get you back to your car. My car, technically, but let’s not split hairs.”

He’s unbelievable. “Italy?”

“Well, Florence, eventually. But there’s no hurry; like I said, I’ve got a lot of spare time.”

“You don’t even know me,” she says after a minute, because she can’t think of anything else.

“I’d like to. That’s why I’m asking you out. Watch the -- ” He steers her around a little stone bench. Under their feet, gravel pebbles roll and shift. 

“You’re dead and you’re broke,” Selina says, working a little too hard to recover. “Neither one suits me. I’m a girl of expensive tastes, and I don’t like cold men.”

“Do you know,” Bruce says conversationally, “until I met you, I really thought I might have lost my sense of humor? I mean, I never had much of one. But I thought it might really be down for the count. Total flatline.”

“I’m rapidly losing mine,” Selina says. 

“Let me make dinner for you,” he says. “That’s all I’m asking.”

“You’re homeless. Where exactly --”

“How about yours?” he says. “I’ll cook, I’ll bring the music, I’ll even clean up after. All you have to do is open the door.”

They’ve come to the parking lot at the back of the house. Bruce reaches casually into his jacket pocket. There’s a little warbling beep, and the Aventador’s lights flash as the locks pop open.

He lifts his eyebrows in amusement, seeing her expression. “Spare car key. You couldn’t have thought I just had the one?”

“Actually, I thought you didn’t have any,” she says. She tries to edge around him to the driver’s side, but he’s faster than she is and gets to the door, opening it with smooth, practiced rich-boy polish. He’s positioned himself so she has to slide alongside him to get in, her shoulder brushing his chest, and he takes her gloved hand -- courtly as an old retainer -- to help her in. He still smells so good. The first gentle cold of a snowflake stings against her cheek. 

“You can close the door now,” she says haughtily.

“Friday,” he says. He’s still holding her hand. “Your place, at eight. Do you eat steak?” 

“I eat everything.” 

“So that’s a yes?” he says.

Selina bites her lip.

“Yes,” she says finally, and the slow smile grows in his eyes again. 

“Great,” he says, and leans in.

She closes her eyes -- but his mouth only brushes her cheekbone, just beneath where the fascinator’s veil falls. His lips are barely parted, his breath hot and soft. It’s much, much worse than a kiss.

“See you on Friday,” he says softly, into her temple where her hair is pulled back. 

“If you’re lucky,” she manages. She feels his mouth curve up against her skin, and then he stands again -- and as he does, he tightens his grip on her hand for a moment and pulls her glove off, neatly and smoothly as unzipping a dress and sliding it off the shoulders. The hair on her forearm stands up where the silk drew over it. He rolls the glove up like a bandage, tidy and businesslike, and tucks it into his jacket pocket.

“If you want it back,” he says, “I’ll see you on Friday.”

“Close the door,” she says, and he closes it, stepping back as he does with a courteous little nod. 

She shakes herself all over, gets the key in the ignition. The steering wheel is cold on her bare left palm. 

“This is the weirdest date I’ve ever been on,” she tells him through the closed window, and she watches his eyes smile: watches his mouth say, _You're welcome._


End file.
